Haven't given that much thought before :I Very interested in her origin, probably the deepest part of hell reserved for Noober, Aerie, Gaelan Bayle, Xan and ofc... Imoen.
"Imoen's popularity was a surprise, mostly because she didn't exist. What's that mean? Her character was a late addition to fill a non-psychotic-thief gap in the early levels. We had no recording budget left, so I assembled her lines by editing voice-over left from a scrapped demo. The original character was a guard named Pique. That's why she has no standalone confrontations / interactions with other party members, which makes her relationship to the player seem closer, and led to making her a half-sister in BG II."
So, unfortunately, we will never know where Imoen, from the in-game perspective, came from.
When Sarevok is older than CHARNAME, did they keep him as a child at the temple? Why did they not sacrifice him as an infant, like CHARNAME? How long did they keep him before sacrificing him?
I'm pretty sure we've had that discussion before on the forums. Was it as part of the whole how-do-different-CHARNAME-races-work-with-the-story thing?
Anyway, I think my conclusion was that the children weren't just sacrificed one after the other as they came, but rather herded together in preparation for one big event. Not surprising, considering that many of Bhaal's children were apparently born while he was still alive - hence the age differences between them (Sarevok a long-trained Deathbringer, Sendai a grown drow, Yaga-Shura and Gromnir seem older etc. etc.). I believe that if you follow the chronology and the supposed age of CHARNAME, he/she was also born before Bhaal's Death, which happened 10 years before the beginning of BG1.
My guess is that Bhaal's priesthood simply went around collecting children of their god so they could be sure that if the time came, they would die - but only then. Wouldn't want them to die before Bhaal, right?
That could also explain what happened at the Temple with Gorion and the Harpers - assuming that the events took place in or around the Time of Troubles, there would be a certain urgency to the whole operation. Bhaal was dead, and the children would soon be killed - how soon, Gorion probably did not know (might have taken more time to gather all of the children), but safe > sorry when it comes to crazed Bhaalites and child sacrifice. That one's a bit flexible though; it's possible that all this happened before the ToT and Gorion didn't really know at the time what was going on. Could be he just got a tip about a Temple of Bhaal with lots of children that really shouldn't be there, and acted on that. He may have learned the truth of Alaundo's Prophecies only later, and pieced it all together then; in fact, that may even be why he came to Candlekeep in the first place and ended up staying there, to study the Prophecies in more detail.
So it would theoretically be possible that Sarevok and CHARNAME did have the same mother? Or do the priests only have one child each? This is if CHARNAME was a human.
I guess it's possible THEORETICALLY, but I've always assumed that Bhaal had a whole lot of children, of all races. It's not impossible that some women gave birth more than once, especially if they were priestesses of Bhaal (as CHARNAME's mother apparently was). Though I'd say that Bhaal had a whole lot of children, so the chances of CHARNAME, Sarevok, or Imoen actually having the same mother are probably slim.
I agree with Bhaal having many children, but how many priestess can there be at one temple? If you and Sarevok were born at the SAME temple, it might be a bit more possible.
That's assuming Sarevok was in fact also born at that temple, and not somewhere else - which is just as likely. I'd say it's highly probable that priestesses were the minority among Bhaal's mates, for the simple reason that they were the obvious choice for anyone of Bhaal's enemies to go to once they figured out what was going on. For that matter, we don't even KNOW that CHARNAME was actually born at the temple Gorion found him/her at, do we? We know he/she was born to a priestess of Bhaal, but that could have been anywhere, really, from under a hedge by the road to some other temple of Bhaal somewhere.
Regarding Imoen, as @bengoshi said she was a last-minute addition to the game in the first place and thus her backstory (particularly in BG1) is very vague at best, and her status as a child of Bhaal was only added in BG2 in the first place. We have nothing concrete, only speculation and conjecture.
If demons get killed on Toril they are banished from it for 100 years. Maybe if Gods get killed, with plans for sacrificial resurrection, it takes a number of years to take start taking effect (10 perhaps?).
The general sort of timeline is as follows:
1348 - Birth of CHARNAME Somewhere between 1349 and 1352 - Harper Attack on Temple (Charname mentions nothing about the attack so he/she can't have been very old or he/she would have remembered something, considering it would be quite a traumatic event) 1358 - Time of Troubles (Bhaal's death) 1368 - Start of game (Charname is 20)
I should add on that Sarevok knew about his lineage and so on from Winski, but also from a Bhaalyn priest that he interrogated. So perhaps the priest let slip something about a particular time that Bhaal was set to start his return, prompting Sarevok to act and cause the iron crisis.
Comments
Luke Kristjanson, a writer for Bioware, in the interview here: http://www.ign.com/articles/2008/12/23/baldurs-gate-memories?page=2 says:
"Imoen's popularity was a surprise, mostly because she didn't exist. What's that mean? Her character was a late addition to fill a non-psychotic-thief gap in the early levels. We had no recording budget left, so I assembled her lines by editing voice-over left from a scrapped demo. The original character was a guard named Pique. That's why she has no standalone confrontations / interactions with other party members, which makes her relationship to the player seem closer, and led to making her a half-sister in BG II."
So, unfortunately, we will never know where Imoen, from the in-game perspective, came from.
Anyway, I think my conclusion was that the children weren't just sacrificed one after the other as they came, but rather herded together in preparation for one big event. Not surprising, considering that many of Bhaal's children were apparently born while he was still alive - hence the age differences between them (Sarevok a long-trained Deathbringer, Sendai a grown drow, Yaga-Shura and Gromnir seem older etc. etc.). I believe that if you follow the chronology and the supposed age of CHARNAME, he/she was also born before Bhaal's Death, which happened 10 years before the beginning of BG1.
My guess is that Bhaal's priesthood simply went around collecting children of their god so they could be sure that if the time came, they would die - but only then. Wouldn't want them to die before Bhaal, right?
That could also explain what happened at the Temple with Gorion and the Harpers - assuming that the events took place in or around the Time of Troubles, there would be a certain urgency to the whole operation. Bhaal was dead, and the children would soon be killed - how soon, Gorion probably did not know (might have taken more time to gather all of the children), but safe > sorry when it comes to crazed Bhaalites and child sacrifice. That one's a bit flexible though; it's possible that all this happened before the ToT and Gorion didn't really know at the time what was going on. Could be he just got a tip about a Temple of Bhaal with lots of children that really shouldn't be there, and acted on that. He may have learned the truth of Alaundo's Prophecies only later, and pieced it all together then; in fact, that may even be why he came to Candlekeep in the first place and ended up staying there, to study the Prophecies in more detail.
So we don't know anything at all about Imoen?
Regarding Imoen, as @bengoshi said she was a last-minute addition to the game in the first place and thus her backstory (particularly in BG1) is very vague at best, and her status as a child of Bhaal was only added in BG2 in the first place. We have nothing concrete, only speculation and conjecture.
If demons get killed on Toril they are banished from it for 100 years. Maybe if Gods get killed, with plans for sacrificial resurrection, it takes a number of years to take start taking effect (10 perhaps?).
The general sort of timeline is as follows:
1348 - Birth of CHARNAME
Somewhere between 1349 and 1352 - Harper Attack on Temple (Charname mentions nothing about the attack so he/she can't have been very old or he/she would have remembered something, considering it would be quite a traumatic event)
1358 - Time of Troubles (Bhaal's death)
1368 - Start of game (Charname is 20)